CIA Paying AT&T $10 Million a Year for International Phone Records

As
part of a voluntary contract, the CIA pays AT&T more than $10
million per year for access to the company's giant database of
international phone records, which includes information on Americans,
according to a report in the New York Times.

Per
the Times, this is how the agreement works: The CIA, again without
any sort of subpoena or court order, gives a phone number of a
"terrorism suspect" to AT&T, which then searches through its
database for any information that might help identify the CIA target.
The database includes information not just on AT&T customers, but
on any phone calls that passed through its networks.

The
majority of the data provided by AT&T involves calls between foreigners, though obviously sometimes information about calls to or from
Americans is handed over as well. But, uh, don't worry too much:
According to the Times' government sources, AT&T "masks"
several digits of Americans' phone numbers, though those numbers are
easily unmasked with the help of an administrative subpoena from the
FBI.

Unlike
the communications giants targeted by the NSA, like Google, Yahoo,
and Verizon, AT&T appears to be the only company that not only
voluntarily partnered with a U.S. spy agency but also directly
profited from that partnership. (CORRECTION: The NSA reportedly paid communications companies, like Verizon and AT&T, hundreds of millions of dollars for accessing their databases.)

"We
value our customers' privacy and work hard to protect it by
ensuring compliance with the law in all respects," Mark Siegel, an
AT&T spokesman, told the Times. "We do not comment on questions
concerning national security."

This
is not the first time AT&T has worked with – and accepted
payment from – a U.S. law enforcement agency: In September, the New
York Times reported that AT&T provided the DEA with phone records
as part of a 26-year-long agreement.